


turn your Head, tilt your Neck

by orphan_account



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Other, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-29
Updated: 2018-06-29
Packaged: 2019-05-30 16:35:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15100754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: “So, how strong are you, really?”“I guess I’ll find out.”





	turn your Head, tilt your Neck

It’s in the middle of  the night, when even the stray dogs sleep, however restlessly. The only people brazen enough to be awake right now are those who the hour was named after. The moon’s  nothing but a deep yellow crescent, a sideways slit of an eye, and there are no stars.

He’s in Mazelinka’s shack, fiddling with a fountain pen on her table. The hour is where he’s strongest, yes, but so is she. And she’s got years of more experience than him, so he follows her ‘no magic inside’ rule. Still, he can feel his aura cracking open his skin, oozing from every line, underneath his fingernails.   
  


They used to be most beautiful during this time, when their magic flowed out of them like some aurora borealis. He could have stared at their aura for ages, years, decades, centuries.   
  
Julian sleeps during this time, so Asra does too. When he sleeps, he can see how messy Julian truly is, amongst all the bravado and insecurities.

Asra stops pushing the pen around, and glances at the compass. Grabs it. Puts it on his lap. Feels how it doesn’t move.

It’s the exact opposite of Ilya. Julian never stops moving, never stops reminding Asra how alive and present he is. It’s like a clock going in full-speed, or the wheels of a wagon moving on and on and on. That’s what got him dragged into this, isn’t it? He grabbed onto the minute hands or the tail-edge of the wheels and now he couldn’t let go, they’re going too fast.

It should have served for Asra to run away from everything, but if anything it just makes everything worse, because he can’t help but look back.

Mazelinka knows all this. She’s like the mother Asra never had. She knows all of this, and she’s been silent for a solid ten minutes. The grandfather clock ticks away the seconds until his aura will recede back to its shell, and he’ll be presentable once again.

It’s after another five minutes, until she speaks, her voice old and croaky from age. It’s the exact voice that’s perfect for chants she’s never uttered. (Asra knows all of them. The ones that peel away your tendons and turn your legs to splinters and your skull to dust. It’s not as effective, because his voice gets too soft.)

“Well, child. Does Ilya love you?”

“No.” Asra says, quickly. It almost feels like a denial, or a confession. “He doesn’t know what love is. He thinks attention is love and that kindness is devotion. He thinks since i’m trying to be gentle, that I could learn to care.” His shoulders tense, then bunch.   
  
His voice switches to a whisper. “I don’t. I don’t want that. I don’t want to be nice to him, just so he can keep fanning his own daydreams.”

“Be cruel, then.” Mazelinka says, grim. “Be cruel and blunt, make his heart fracture. It will better for him in the end. Fractures heal, but scars do not.”

Asra looks down to the compass that never, never pointed north. Fractures of a heart caused by swift words heal, yes. Maybe he could make it hurt less, when he eventually gave up trying. It would be better to rip off a bandage quickly than to let it drag on.

Asra thinks about the color red, closes his eyes. ( _“I’ll never leave you. I will always be here, walking down your road by your side. This I swear.”)_  His hands do not twitch. His veins and nerves are dead, so they do not push until he pulls them. That is the price for the loss of his heart.

“No. Scars don’t heal. They fade, though.” He answers, when he thinks about how they couldn’t recognize his face, due to the blood in their eyes. How they turned more into ash than human, and how they died nothing more than a shadow.

Mazelinka grunts, and keeps stirring her elixir. “You make it sound like that isn’t even worse.”

 

* * *

 

He is beautiful, it’s so obvious to Asra that it hurts. The excitement of fireworks, the taste of whiskey. Julian is predictable in all the unpredictable ways; the whirlwind above stability.

Julian is incredibly beautiful, and Asra feels sick. He is sharp, the edge of a knife. Brass laughter, bold declarations, even bolder actions. He doesn’t think, and just does. Never thinking about what would happen when he does.

Asra thinks too much, and he still does anyway, with his thought screaming at him not to. They are awful together. Doing too much, and not thinking enough, never stopping to realize that maybe they shouldn’t.

If Asra squints, he could see a watercolor image of the both of them standing next to each other, happy. At least, only Julian is. Asra is there too, but he can’t imagine himself smiling so much.

He wonders is Julian notices how when they meet skin to skin, only Julian’s heart pounds. Perhaps he thinks that their heartbeats bleed together to form as one. Maybe he thinks that his mouth is enough for two people. Maybe he thinks Asra’s heart beats so fast it’s almost non-existent.

Asra once wished that that was true.

 _(Not much longer. Soon his heart will be enough, and the storm that brews on the edges of the beetles wings will be released. Everything’s coming. They are coming. Asra will make sure of it.He’ll follow them to where he can’t go_.)

 

* * *

 

Muriel used to call him soft. Maybe he was, when the scrape of the cobblestone streets made his feet raw, when he cried over the death of a flower. Sometimes, when Asra passed through the ruins of Vesuvia, and saw the children bare and black, he used to get pangs on his chest so hard, he’d weep. He would have given them all the food he could have, because he remembered what if felt like to go weeks without seeing a crumb of bread. He used to be soft, that much he’s certain about.

It is much easier to kill an insect when you forget how it feels like to be one. Asra has not lost his compassion, but his empathy is gone.

_This is how the divine feel like, probably. When you don’t have a heart, you’re pretty much dead, or immortal, right?_

He is not soft anymore. You cannot be soft when you are spilling pomegranate and blood all over an ink made from horse bone. You cannot be soft when suddenly the pull of the magnet of a magic no one is to enter through finally clicks you in. He’s in the wrong path, and he knows it. Nothing about this is accidental.

“So, how strong are you, really?” Julian asks him one night, during a random bout of confidence, when he was still glowing after the sex and glowed over how gently Asra tried to wipe away his cuts. “Everyone says you’re more than just a fortune-teller who can play a bit of water tricks.” Ilya grins, gorgeously, and Asra stifles annoyance. It will never be as pretty as their smile, and for that Asra hates Ilya’s grin.

_What is strength? Am I strong? A strong person would have moved on, or let themselves die as well. They would have stayed soft. To be strong is to be constant._

“Depends on what you mean by strong. Do you mean how far my magic goes?” He replies. The first question he asked is not the one he wanted the answer to. Ilya wanted to know something much more superficial.

Julian nods, hopeful. Asra closes his eyes, pictures the color red. Forces his fingertips to move, to twitch. “I don’t really know.” He opens his eyes again, and imagines the line on his palms to say something different than what is said. Imagines all the runes and scars that would have been there if he wasn’t so good at erasing them.

_I will move the creases of my skin if that is what it takes._

“I guess I’ll find out eventually.”

_I will break myself and throw everything I have, because they would do the same, if they were as weak as I._

Julian isn’t pleased, but swallows the answer.

 

* * *

 

He is shaking, and it is the first time he moves without conscious thought. The anger in him is making his blood  _boil_ and the feeling of living flows him as much as his rage does. It’s no wonder that so many who follow the path he does are filled with hate.

This is the first time he’s felt alive, and his magic  _reels_  with the feeling. The room lamps burst into belches of fire before fluttering out and a servant squeaks. As far as they knew, he was a water witch.

Lucio is unfazed, and he can see the glint of a guillotine in his teeth. Asra is shaking, and his head is swirling and Julian’s trying to calm him down, he thinks.

( _It is because of you. It is because of you. You started this plague because you could not rip out hearts with your hands anymore, so you make them rot._

_They are heartless, and therefore untethered because of you. They are dead, because of you. They are dead because of you because of you because of you because of YOU BECAUSE OF YOU- )_

Asra does not notice his veins glow with blue then with black, he does not notice his pupils disappear. He does not notice as all the hexes and curses he has ever learned brands his skin, and then pools into the carpet of the room, their whispers causing the servant to throw up, and run away, screeching for help.

He is shaking, and his voice is the quietest he has ever heard it. “What?”

_(Death is not the end, but for you I will make it the end. I will kill you, and rip your heart, the same you have done to me. )_

Julian stands behind him, and it’s clear that he’s scared. The shadows of his curses grow, and they whisper with their voice in a thousand different ways, all of them wrong.

His heart does not beat, because it is hidden in the Lazaret, waiting for the blood moon eclipse to be strong enough to build a body from scratch.

“Asra,  _stop_! This-what you’re doing is..Asra.  _Please,_  don’t. Whatever you are right now,  _no_.” He pleads, and Asra cannot find himself to care. Julian has never been good with the words that matter.

He slowly takes his hand on Asra’s shoulder, and Asra would warm him not to touch him, but there is too much teeth in his mouth and the bile and blood and the black ink fill it. So when Julian yelps in pain, Asra does not move when he flinches away, nursing his wound.

His gaze is fixed on Lucio, and the latter is grinning. His drawl is lazy. He is from the South, he does not scare easily. Magic should have been in his blood.

“Didn’t know that you could use this magic, Asra. You should have told me! It would have been _immensely_  useful.” He says, and Asra burns. His magic is so close, it’s brimming and threatening to spill and Asra is shaking too much to stop it.

“Shame about your little  _friend_ , though. They seemed _delightful_ , really. “

Asra lunges, and his hands are wrapped around Lucios throat and he finally lets go, and watches unblinkingly as every drop of his blood freezes, turns to ice, one by one. Lucio wheezes, but the grin is still in place. The shadows dripping from his back scream in reply, and Asra cannot think.

Lucio’s eyes are as red as theirs, and it gives him no pity.

_(I will kill you because you killed them I will kill you because you killed them an eye for an eye an eye for an eye a heart for a heart a life for a life-)_

He does not notice how Julian thrashes him away, and how his skin burns with the curses as Asra finally screams.

The shadows turn the day to night, and Asra feels nothing but pain. The rivers freeze over, turn to ash and crimson, and the forest dries up. The city is drenched in black and Asra feels nothing but pain. He doesn’t care, he doesn’t care he doesn’t care.

He screams and screams and screams, instead.

Julian is the only one who lets his hands burn when Asra bites his fingers, to try to make him let Asra go.

He screams for as long as his voice permits it, and then when it does not, he collapses to his knees and sobs out the rest. Julian carries him, and Asra curls up, not seeing how their trail is causing the ocean surrounding the city to riot.

( _This city was already damned in the beginning; what is a few more?)_

Julian nearly carried him to the shop, but Asra convulses. “N-no. Please. Anywhere but there. I can’t. _I can’t.”_

They go to Mazelinkas instead, and Asra, not for the first time, desperately wishes he had died with them.

 

* * *

 

“ _So, how strong are you, really?”_

_“I guess I’ll find out.”_

 

* * *

 

Julian is the only one who looks him in the eyes for two months. Ilya, awful, stupid Ilya, is many things but not someone who is fears in the face of the already known. Unlike Asra, he is brave in all the ways that are most important.

He holds Asra’s hands the week he finally came to the palace again, and looked Asra in the eyes deeply, pleading. “It’s ok. We all would have done the same thing if we were you.”

Asra let’s Ilya hold his hands, but he doesn’t look at his face when he answers. “No, you wouldn’t have.”

 

* * *

 

Julian is too much. He is too much. Every second, he is there, hammering away at Asra’s faults like Asra is a plague to cure. Every hour he glances at him longingly, and it makes Asra’s toes curl when Julian begs him to be kinder, to be smarter, to be better.

_“I won’t be able to protect you if you keep slacking off. Lucio won’t like this. You can do better.”_

Asra knows he is far from perfect, but he doesn’t need to be reminded constantly how badly colored he is in the sun.

Julian loves, he does. But his mind is too full of roses and perfect fairy tales that by the time they have one conversation, Asra is a paper mosaic of the ideal version for himself.

According to Ilyas dreams, he is supposed to be teasing, mysterious, mischievous, and playing hard to get. It’s sickeningly perfect. The dream Asra has skin too clear, and eyes too big. The dream Asra will eventually cave in and let Julian take over his mind like the dream Asra has done to Julian.

There is no mention about how still Asra is at times, when he doesn’t remind his fingers to tap. There is no mention of how sometimes Asra sleeps for a day straight or how the candle in the shop never welcomes anyone in. It does not say anything about how Asra forgets to wash his face, or how Asra stares into the rain, wishing and praying and begging for someone to come back by saying the same name over and over. (To be fair, Julian does not know about the last one.)

Dream Asra has no flaws, so Julian pokes Real Asra with his words and sighs, since Real Asra is so much worse than Dream Asra.

 

* * *

 

It’s the sixth time Julian had broken into his shop that Asra bends his patience and turns it to dust.

The cards are facedown on the backroom table, and there is no lamplight, so Julian does not see how still Asra’s pulse is.

Asra is angry. It was their birthday today, and as a celebration gift, he had received ten freshwater pearls and a heaping handful of peridot dust. A consolation gift, from the Lazaret. There was a plainly written note, too. Esteemed Resident of Vesuvia, we are so sorry for your loss. Please take these to show our sympathy for your situation.

“Ilya,” He says, like he always does. He suddenly hates the name, because it is not theirs. “What are you doing here?”

Julian does not stutter, a sign that he has had at least one cup of brandy. “Lucio is uhh.. He’s very,  _very_  angry with you, and I..hmm. I can’t do anything about it,  _hic_! anymore.”

Julian, the only man Lucio tolerated to the point of just taunting. If the man could pick favorites, he had chosen Ilya. He chose many people for their worth.

He had married Nadia for her wit and her beauty, and for her status. He had chosen Julian as his personal doctor for the sake of old times, and he had dragged Asra by his throat because Asra had two things he didn’t. (Muriel, and magic that stretched a bit farther than usual.)

Lucio was always angry with Asra, and to that Asra will spit on the floor. “I don’t need your protection, Ilya, as much as I appreciate the offer. I can take care of myself.”

“Of course you can take care of yourself,” Julian says, arms tense, “but that doesn’t mean you  _have_  to.”

_(When’s the last time you let your walls down for anyone except Muri? Soon enough, you’ll forget that your heart is built to be cared for by someone else.)_

Asra’s breath hitches. A flash of triumph grows in Julian’s expression. Asra places his hands on the table, palms down, and they do not shake. He will never be as angry as he was back then.

‘You don’t understand, Ilya.” He says, and something about the way he says it feels wrong, like maybe he shouldn’t have.

“I can’t love you.”

Julian pales, and staggers a bit, leaning on the edge of the door-frame for support. He’s heard this before, but this time Asra is over pretending that he didn’t mean it. There is no light, so it’s just his silohuette, and the whites of his eyes.   
  
Julian is tipsy, but Asra cannot take it anymore.

  
  
“I can make you,” Julian says, and it’s nearing on desperate. He’s already been trying so hard.  “I can-”

  
  
“No.” Asra shakes his head, even though Julian will barely be able to see it.“No. I can’t love you.”   
  


 

This time, Julian is as still as Asra is, and Asra knows that his heart is fracturing, breaking. 

  
  
“Please, Ilya.” He offers, because he has nothing better to offer instead. “Go home, rest.”

  
  
_This isn’t working like I wanted it to, and this isn’t working like you wanted it to. Let me go, and let me fall back into a different cage, one that isn’t you._

Ilya is tipsy, so he doesn’t say anything, and leaves, closing the door behind him. When Asra believes he is truly alone, he slumps, and lays his head against the table, eyes horribly dry, chest awfully empty.

**Author's Note:**

> Not a huge fan of asrian in a romantic sense, but their dynamic is great to write!


End file.
